After we get through a slew of great open source project achievements, we discuss the slippery slope that online services represent to Linux users.

Plus we get all big picture, what can be learned from ownCloud’s recent troubles, what we conclude by reading between the lines & more!

• Get Paid to Write for DigitalOcean

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Show Notes:

Pre-Show

• Muhammad Ali & IBM sought to “shake up the world” with Linux | Network World

Follow Up / Catch Up

The new Control Center Shell

A demonstration of the new Control Center UI being developed

Arc Is a Gorgeous GTK Theme for Linux Desktops

It has been a veritable eon since we last highlighted a GTK theme here on this site.

• Arc Icon Theme Released Based on Moka, Here’s How to Install on Your Linux OS

• You Can Now Have All the Ubuntu 16.04 LTS Live DVDs into a Single ISO Image

Yes, the moment you’ve been waiting for is here, and you can now have all the essential Ubuntu 16.04 LTS (Xenial Xerus) Live CD editions into a single ISO image. Linux AIO Ubuntu 16.04 includes Ubuntu 16.04 LTS, Ubuntu MATE 16.04 LTS, Kubuntu 16.04 LTS, Xubuntu 16.04 LTS, Lubuntu 16.04 LTS, and Ubuntu GNOME 16.04 LTS.

• Linux AIO

TING

• Ting – mobile that makes sense

Trisquel is about ethics not technology or innovation

So, please, stop thinking about snappy packages and begin enjoying your LIBERTAD (FREEDOM).

Firefox 47.0

Embedded YouTube videos now play with HTML5 video if Flash is not installed.

• Firefox 47 widens HTML5 video support to include DRM-protected streams

Support for Google’s Widevine CDM — which is currently limited to Windows and OS X — was first introduced to the Nightly build of Firefox two months ago, and has made a seamless transition to the stable build.

DigitalOcean

• DigitalOcean: SSD Cloud Server, VPS Server, Simple Cloud Hosting

What we can learn from ownCloud’s collapse

Another factor in ownCloud’s undoing could be venture capitalists. Jos Poortvliet, the ownCloud community manager who now works at Nextcloud told me that a lot of ownCloud features were held back because developers had to convince investors in 30 seconds. And every such conversation led to a comparison with Dropbox. Investors would refuse features on the basis that Dropbox doesn’t do that.

Linux Academy

• Linux Academy | Linux and AWS Online Training

Slipping Into Google

• How I Quit Google | TIME

• Google Now Launcher – Android Apps on Google Play

Upgrade the launcher on your Android device for a fast, clean home screen that puts Google Now just a swipe away.

• Google now

• Google VR – Daydream

• Google Chrome continues to be my go to browser for work. Makes switching to Linux easier.

• Google stuff tends to have a Linux solution

Support Jupiter Broadcasting on Patreon

The post Mind on my Cloud & Cloud on my Mind | LINUX Unplugged 148 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

With Mike’s move to Florida in progress he joins us via phone for a run through of the major JetBrains subscription hoopla, transitioning from a tester to a developer & that big poaching scandal comes to an expensive close!

Thanks to:

• Get Paid to Write for DigitalOcean

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Show Notes:

Hoopla

How I went from a tester to a developer role

• How JetBrains Lost Years of Customer Loyalty in Just a Few Hours

Yesterday’s big news, at least for many developers, is that JetBrains – maker of popular tools like IntelliJ and ReSharper – is moving to a software-as-a-service subscription model for their products.

Previously, buying a JetBrains product got you a perpetual license and a year of upgrades. Once the license expired, any software you had received under that license would continue to work, but you would need to buy another license to get further upgrades. It was a simple model that worked just fine for many people, and most customers upgraded every year.

Starting November 2, though, that all stops. After that date, JetBrains will no longer sell these perpetual licenses. Instead, you can rent access to their software on a month-by-month basis.

• Introducing JetBrains Toolbox, easier access to your coding tools, more control and flexibility, and a lower entry price | JetBrains Company Blog

As of November 2, 2015, we will introduce JetBrains Toolbox—a collection of our popular desktop tools (IDEs, utilities and extensions) available on a monthly or yearly subscription basis. With JetBrains Toolbox, you can pick and choose one or more tools that best suit your current needs, or go for the ‘All products’ plan that comes with special savings. You decide what to put in your Toolbox and for how long.

• All Products $ 19.90 /month

• kreay’s top comments on reddit )

My indie (personal) IntelliJ purchase was $100/year. Now it’s $120/year (except for the first-year upgrade hook of $10 off) and it now turns off after each year.

Don’t Build a Billion-Dollar Business. Really.

Apple, Google, and other tech giants will pay $415 million in poaching scandal settlement

Feedback

• Which direction?

• New Monitor

The post Subscription Lock-in | CR 169 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

How willing is Apple to leverage it’s developers to make a public statement? We look at the response to the confederate flag pullings & we debate if any gatekeeper puts developers best interests first.

Plus was the perfect laptop built a decade ago, your feedback & more!

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• Get Paid to Write for DigitalOcean

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Show Notes:

Hoopla:

• Is there just never going to be another great laptop?

Chris’ First Laptop Love

Pismo

Pismo Lust

With cues from the iBook, Pismo implemented the cost-saving, streamlined unified motherboard architecture, with a 400 or 500MHz processor and 100MHz front-side bus. FireWire? Check. AGP graphics? Check. Airport? Check. Expansion bay? Check. Still cool 10 years later? Check.

In the field, a fresh 50 Watt-Hour Apple battery with a full charge yields up to 5 hours of use. Using two batteries can increase that to as much as 10 hours. Replacement batteries can boost that by up to 60%, for a potential 8 hours with one battery and 16 hours with two!

• Apple joins Confederate flag boycott, removes apps that use flag in offensive or mean-spirited ways

Currently, affected titles include Ultimate General: Gettysburg; several Hunted Cow/HexWar Games Civil War games; and more. The ban has also affected select apps, like “Southern Pride (Rebel Flag) Wallpaper,”

• The King’s Mores | dominickm.com

• Google’s search practices come under scrutiny from leading academic Wu

Feedback:

• Advice for someone starting as a new Ruby on Rails dev

• Linux Academy | Linux and AWS Online Training

• Taylor Swift & Apple

• Starting a teaching business: want a web app learn people mo’ betta.

The post Developer Commodity | CR 160 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

During a recent passionate speech Richard Stallman said users of proprietary software are victims, we’ll debate of that’s true & play other clips from his speech.

Then we’ll look at the recent exodus of Mac developers, ponder if this a trend worth paying attention to & if Linux is ready to take advantage of it.

Plus the pants debt comes due, your feedback & much more!

Thanks to:

• Get Paid to Write for DigitalOcean

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Show Notes:

Pre-Show:

• Jitsi Meet

FU:

• Some news from KDENLIVE

• Pants on Head

• SCALE 13x | 13x -Hilton Los Angeles Airport • February 19-22 2015

• LinuxFest Northwest 2015 – Bellingham, WA • April 25th & 26th

• Picks · Linux Action Show

C3TV – Freedom in your computer and in the net

For freedom in your own computer, the software must be free. For freedom on the internet, we must organize against surveillance, censorship, SaaSS and the war against sharing.

Macs Exodus

Apple has lost the functional high ground – Marco.org

Apple’s hardware today is amazing — it has never been better. But the software quality has fallen so much in the last few years that I’m deeply concerned for its future. I’m typing this on a computer whose existence I didn’t even think would be possible yet, but it runs an OS with embarrassing bugs and fundamental regressions. Just a few years ago, we would have relentlessly made fun of Windows users for these same bugs on their inferior OS, but we can’t talk anymore.

Geoff Wozniak went back to desktop Linux after almost a decade on OS X (Update: He appears to have taken the post down). It’s just one person’s story, but many of his cited reasons resonate widely. I suspect the biggest force keeping stories like this from being more common is that Windows is still worse overall and desktop Linux is still too much of a pain in the ass for most people. But it should be troubling if a lot of people are staying on your OS because everything else is worse, not necessarily because they love it.

• What it’s like to be way too popular for a day – Marco.org

Why I quit OS X – Curried lambda

After nearly 10 years of using OS X as my primary OS for personal work, I switched away in late 2014. I consider it to be the best tech decision I made last year.

Furthermore, I found that I had stopped using the majority of the primary apps that ship with OS X: Mail, Safari, iTunes, and Apple Creativity Apps/iLife. For the most part, I ran essentially three apps: Firefox, MailMate, and iTerm2. Most of my work was done in terminals. The culture of the operating system at this point was more about sharing than personal productivity.

In short, I was working against the grain of the environment. It was a gradual transition, but OS X went from a useful tool set to get my work done to an obnoxious ecosystem of which I no longer wanted to be a part.

More damning than the lack of personal connection, though, was the complete lack of transparency and general decline in software quality, as I perceived it.

At this point, my default position on Apple software in OS X has moved from “probably good” to “probably not OK”. They seem more interested in pumping out quantity by way of more upgrades. It’s death by a thousand cuts, but it’s death nonetheless.

I’ve gone back to a desktop system running Linux (for now) and while I consider it markedly inferior to OS X in terms of usability, it feels like a personal computer again. I’m enjoying the experience and I look forward to working with it, even when it’s a monumental pain in the ass.

Panic Blog » The 2014 Panic Report

This is the biggest problem we’ve been grappling with all year: we simply don’t make enough money from our iOS apps. We’re building apps that are, if I may say so, world-class and desktop-quality. They are packed with features, they look stunning, we offer excellent support for them, and development is constant. I’m deeply proud of our iOS apps. But… they’re hard to justify working on.

Runs Linux from the people:

• Send in a pic/video of your runs Linux.
• Please upload videos to YouTube and submit a link via email or the subreddit.

New Shows : Tech Talk Today (Mon – Thur)

• Tech Talk Today Today | Jupiter Broadcasting

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Post-Show

• Arch Linux 2015 Statistics: GNOME is now the most installed desktop

The post Proprietary Exodus | LINUX Unplugged 74 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

Based on Debian SolydXK offers all the advantages of a rolling release, with a safe and sensible approach. But where does this new distro stack up compared to the big dogs? And what challenges do we think they might face in the near future? Tune in to find out!

Plus why Chromium is dropping GTK, Valve drops some code, Intel drops a Linux bomb…

AND SO MUCH MORE!

All this week on, The Linux Action Show!

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— Show Notes: —

SolydXK Linux Review:

Brought to you by: System76

• SolydX | SolydXK

SolydXK is a Dutch semi-rolling release Linux distribution based on Debian.2 It aims to be simple to use, providing an environment that is stable, secure, and ideal for small businesses, non-profit organizations and home users

SolydXK includes proprietary software such as Adobe Flash, Steam and optional closed-source drivers to provide initial multimedia usage and gaming on Linux

• After first book a straightforward Welcome Screen with driver assistance pops up.
• Welcome screen also has community resource links

SolydXK originated in 2012 as an unofficial version of “Linux Mint Debian edition” (LMDE) using the KDE desktop environment.

In November 2012, Linux Mint ceased maintaining both the KDE and XFCE versions of LMDE. SolydXK was started to support these two desktop environments. “SolydX” refers to the XFCE version, while “SolydK” refers to the KDE version. The web site url is an amalgam of the two names.

SolydX is a Debian based distribution with the Xfce desktop. It intends to be as light-weight as possible without giving up any of the expected functionality.

SolydX does not need to be reinstalled each time an update is released. You don’t have to reinstall, ever!

Updates are delivered in quarterly packs through the update manager. The update manager sits in your system tray and signals you whenever there is an update available. You can find a detailed description of the update pack process here.

• Update Packs explaine

SolydXK increases stability and security by testing the incoming packages before they are released. To guarantee up-to-date security, the SolydXK Security repository is updated on a daily basis, and therefore the SolydXK security repository is not included in the UP process.

The Update Pack is a quarterly process. The testing period is initiated on the first of the month, and will take two weeks of testing before making the Update Pack available for the public. The following dates are planned testing periods:

To further increase security both Firefox and Thunderbird are being built from source if there are new versions available. These packages do not necessarily follow the UP frequency, but will be released whenever they are available.

• Users can point the update manager directly to Debian Testing, which is the upstream source of all Solyd updates, the default configuration points to the update manager.

• Solyd Software Manager or Synaptic Package Manager.

• Upgdate package manager screen grab in review at ZDNet.

A useable rolling release, with a safety net. Good bye reloads between releases for Mint, or leaps of faith upgrades with Ubuntu.

• For years, I’ve been a pave and rebuild kinda guy. But my current Arch install is going strong from the Arch challenge. And the longer I have ran this install, the more I have come to appreciate how nice it is to just have things like GPG, mail, etc configured and ready all the time.

• Even the minefield of upgrades, even when done with a nice GUI can be a major hassle on any kind of production system, be it a workstation, a studio Skype box, or a server.

• Rolling solves the problem of the pave and rebuild (Mint) and the major upgrade jumps every six months (Ubuntu).

• tech lore by igor: My Review of SolydX 201401

Of the two flavors offered by Solyd, I opted for SolydX, which uses the light-as-a-mouse–hence the mascot–XFCE desktop environment.

Follow SoldXK:

• SolydXK (solydxk) on Twitter
• SolydXK – Google+
• Solyd XK on Facebook
• SolydXK forums

– Picks –

Runs Linux:

• Exstreamer Family Powering the jblive.fm stream and Runs Linux

Desktop App Pick

• Asciinema – Record and share your terminal sessions, the right way

Weekly Spotlight

• Mozilla and Epic Preview Unreal Engine 4 Running in Firefox

Mozilla and Epic Games have showed the power of the Web as a platform for gaming by porting Unreal Engine 3 to the Web and showcasing Epic Citadel, using asm.js, a supercharged subset of JavaScript pioneered by Mozilla. In less than 12 months, optimizations have increased the performance of Web applications using asm.js from 40% to within 67% of native, and we expect it to get even faster. This performance opens up new opportunities for giving users an astonishing and delightful experience, from within their choice of Web browser. Any modern browser can run asm.js content, but specific optimizations currently present only in Firefox, ensure the most consistent and smooth experience.

• Epic Citadel

• Happy GNU/Birthday Stallman!!!

• Happy Birthday Richard Stallman

• Down with TPP | Unfilter 75

— NEWS —

Please opt-in to the dev channel on Linux to test Aura – Google Groups

We aim to launch the Aura graphics stack on Linux in M35. Aura is a cross-platform graphics system, and the Aura frontend will replace the current GTK+ frontend.

• Chrome engineer here. I think people are making a much bigger deal about this than it really is.

I think people are making a much bigger deal about this than it really is.

I’m also the original author of Audacity, which uses wxWidgets.

Is it NIH syndrome? I don’t really think so. We’re not choosing not to use GTK+ or Qt because we don’t want to learn how to use them and we think we could do better, we understand them really well and we specifically want to build something different. It’s harder, but the payoff is worth it.

Note that Chrome still uses GTK+ for theme support, for things like file dialogs, and other desktop integration. It’s just that the main browser window is now rendered using Aura rather than being made up of GTK+ widgets.

For everyone who is saying that GTK+ and Qt support GPU acceleration, of course they do – but they don’t support all of the features Aura does, and it wouldn’t be trivial to add them. Aura composites the whole window – the browser UI, and the webpage, in one pass. That’s a big memory and performance win, but it can’t be done with many graphics toolkits.

Replicant Developers Find Backdoor In Android Samsung Galaxy

The Replicant developers’ research finds "Samsung Galaxy devices running proprietary Android versions come with a back-door that provides remote access to the data stored on the device.

In particular, the proprietary software that is in charge of handling the communications with the modem, using the Samsung IPC protocol, implements a class of requests known as RFS commands, that allows the modem to perform remote I/O operations on the phone’s storage.

As the modem is running proprietary software, it is likely that it offers over-the-air remote control, that could then be used to issue the incriminated RFS messages and access the phone’s file system."

Among the known affected devices are the Nexus S, Galaxy S, Galaxy S2, Galaxy Note, Galaxy Tab 2, Galaxy S 3, and Galaxy Note 2. The Galaxy S seems to be in the worse shape with the back-doored program running as root.

In terms of the legitimacy of the backdoor, the developers believe, “the incriminated RFS messages of the Samsung IPC protocol were not found to have any particular legitimacy nor relevant use-case. However, it is possible that these were added for legitimate purposes, without the intent of doing harm by providing a back-door. Nevertheless, the result is the same and it allows the modem to access the phone’s storage.”

Valve Opens Code

• Valve releases open source Direct3D to OpenGL translator

With little fanfare, Valve has published the source to ToGL, a translation layer to support a subset of the Direct3D 9 API on OpenGL systems. ToGL is a component of the company’s Source 3D engine. Valve has broken it out and slapped a permissive MIT license on it in the hope that it might be useful to other developers.

• ValveSoftware/vogl · GitHub

This project is alpha^2 right now. If you are up for suffering through a bit of pain with early releases, please continue on – we’d love to have your help…

Crytek Showing Off CryEngine On Linux At GDC

Crytek sent out a press release today announcing they will be showing off CryEngine Linux support. Found in a press release today, “During presentations and hands-on demos at Crytek’s GDC booth, attendees can see for the first time ever full native Linux support in the new CRYENGINE. The CRYENGINE all-in-one game engine is also updated with the innovative features used to recreate the stunning Roman Empire seen in Ryse – including the brand new Physically Based Shading render pipeline, which uses real-world physics simulation to create amazingly realistic lighting and materials in CRYENGINE games.”

This upcoming Game Developers’ Conference is happening from 17 to 21 of March in San Francisco at the Moscone Center. Details on the conference can be found via the GDConf.com web-site along with the exhibitors.

Intel processors now get OS locked In an GOLEM

At CEBIT 2014 fair, Frank Kuypers, technical account manager at INTEL corp., proudly presented a new feature in INTEL processors, called “hooks”, beginning with the new 2014 “Merrifield” 64 bit SoC chip generation.

The manager gave an example: In the Intel network only mobiles with certain Android versions are allowed to use certain functionalities. If you then replace your Android version, e.g. by a free Cyanogenmod Android kernel, not only some chips would stop working, e.g. LTE/UMTS, but also mails from your employer would be blinded out, because now the processor itself would ‘classify’ the new software as ‘risk’.

Now, beginning with the new 2014 power efficient mobile “Merrifield” processor generation, this functionality can and will (so are WINTEL alliance plans) be used to lock the processor for certain OS’es or OS versions.

First implementation will be the INTEL owned McAffee virus scanner, which now operates in the background on microcode level, completely unnoticeable by the OS or system operator, Frank Kuypers proudly added.

• alcalde comments on Intel processors now get OS locked

If you read the comments, this article is essentially taking software hooks in Android and projecting this with wild-eyed imagination to ideas of locked OSes and code that runs without OS knowledge, things which have no foundation in the interview which is the ultimate source for the article.

The author also writes things like:

Microcode is very similar to ASIC or FPGA technology (ASIC is much faster, up
to 15 GHz possible). By updating ‘microcode’ you burn new circuits into the
processor, which then has same functionality as software code.

Which suggests he doesn’t really understand what he’s talking about.

Take this article with a Red Sea-level of salt.

– Feedback: –

• How would the Chromebook be bricked by pressing space?

• Thank Blastyr

• Feedback on Feedback – LAS s31e0

• Linux Certifications

• Linux Certs

— Chris’ Stash —

• Studio Awards | FauxShow 168

• CIA vs Senate | Unfilter 89

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The post SolydXK Linux Review | LAS s31e04 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

Is that exploit in your pocket? This week we\’ll ask if Android is Stallman\’s worst nightmare, making Tivo look like a quaint abuser of Linux. And how Linux is poised to push past it\’s current limitations over the next few years.

Then it\’s your feedback, and our follow up!

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— Show Notes: —

FU

• Arch Linux – News: Deprecation of /etc/sysctl.conf

• In your last episode of LAS you talked about note taking programs and I was wondering if you\’ve ever tried Cherrytree? If so, what are your thoughts?

• giuspen

• System76 – Ubuntu Desktop – Leopard Extreme

— Android Love Lost —

• RMS: \’Is Android Really Free Software?\’

Mail Sack:

• Arch Challenge Follow Up

The post The Android Problem | LINUX Unplugged 6 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.